TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (WCTV) – Tallahassee’s Historical Society is fighting the possible demolition of the old Wahnish Cigar Factory.
The 120-year-old brick building, the only cigar factory building left standing in the capital city, could make way for housing.
Bob Holladay, president of the Tallahassee Historical Society, can’t help but think the long and winding history of 469 Saint Francis Street deserves another chapter.
“Both Jewish and Spanish influence here has been significant, you know, from the very beginning,” Holladay said.
Its story began when Jewish immigrant Alfred Wahnish dreamed of turning a sleepy government town into a flourishing tobacco mainstay.
“There was talk of moving the capitol away from Tallahassee,” Erin Vaughn, a local preservation architect, said. “It really revitalized the entire city and that was really, really important. And this building was the hub of that.”
That story continued thirty years ago when Brian Giblett turned the factory into the Cow Haus music venue.
“We had a lot of bands that, you know, that played here before they became huge, like Queens of the Stone Age, Mastodon, New Found Glory,” Giblett said.
Theold Wahnish Cigar Factory(Florida Memory)
More recently, Vaughn’s former boss had hopes to restore the structure for office space.
But, this story may end soon. A Tampa based developer plans to demolish it to build apartments and a four-story parking garage.
“They’ll be able to knock it down. I mean, I have no doubt about that, but God, why?” Holladay said.
That’s despite the building being on both the local and national registers of historic places.
Vaughn prepared the 2018 application to add it to the national register. That distinction doesn’t guarantee protection, but it does provide tax incentives for a future developer to restore rather than raze.
“Preservation and redevelopment do not have to be mutually exclusive. They can actually work together to create something that is valuable to the community,” Vaughn said.
Because the building is under a historic zoning overlay and on the local register, developers were forced to make their case in front of the Tallahassee Trust for Historic Preservation’s Architectural Review Board.
The developer had to prove the building isn’t structurally able to coexist with their plans.
The Trust’s executive director, Shannon Kuch, told WCTV they met the high burden of proof to move forward with the demolition.
This week, the historical society passed a resolution calling on the city to stop the demolition and save the building.
But Mayor John Dailey said it’s gone through the proper channels already.
“I trust this board. They do their homework. They do it really well,” he said. “We’ll do everything we possibly can to save a building when appropriate. But for the review board to come back and make the recommendation it did, makes it sound like it wasn’t structurally safe.”
Holladay said it’s frustrating to see a building earn historic preservation designations, but still face the wrecking ball.
“It makes you feel empty,” he said. “It makes you feel sort of hopeless.”
He’s hoping it’s not too late.
There are at least a couple meetings before demolition day. There’s a meeting of the Development Review Committee next Monday, Aug. 10, where the developer is asking for a setback deviation.
There will also need to be another meeting of the Trust’s Architectural Review Board where the developer will need to present plans to commemorate the building in some way. That could mean creating a plaque or marker about the building’s history or reusing some of the bricks in the new construction.
That meeting’s date is not yet set.
Kuch said no matter how this ends, it serves as a learning moment for all involved.
If more people had taken interest in the building when the developer first met with the board months ago, the concerned parties would have had a better forum to be heard, she said.
WCTV reached out to the developer and did not receive a response.
To keep up with the latest news as it develops, follow WCTV on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Nextdoor and X (Twitter).
Have a news tip or see an error? Write to us here. Please include the article’s headline in your message.
Be the first to see all the biggest headlines by downloading the WCTV News app. Click here to get started.
Copyright 2026 WCTV. All rights reserved.